Tricks of the Trade

I have been thrilled with the great response from fans to Sweet And Wild. I especially loved that I was able to do the deluxe version with Sweet And Mild - the
acoustic version of the album. Music and writing are my life blood. I
breathe it and it comes out of my pores. I am always writing, always
thinking of melodies. It’s like a river flows in my head and if I open a
channel for it to come out, it just pours out. It doesn’t even feel
like it comes from me. It feels like there are operas and novels and
songs already written in my head and I’m just copying them down on paper
as I see it in my mine. Like someone else already wrote them.

The
craft for me has been learning to accurately record them - to find
words that don’t dilute the intense and unique vision that is in my
head. It’s like trying to dress smoke before it deteriorates. I know I
did my job well when I sing what I have written and the words and melody
have the same effect on someone else as the original feeling had on me.
It should give chills or bring tears to their eyes like it did to me
when I first felt it. I try to use melody and my voice and the lyrics
and the chords like tools with that goal: Making people feel something
or see something in a new light that they may have taken for granted
before.

That said, I’m always curious as to which songs people
will identify with the most on an album. I almost didn’t include “Ten”
on this album and so far it’s everyone’s favorite track. Goes to show
I’m not always the best judge!

I feel so blessed to have such
die hard fans after 15 years. This is a very hard business to have any
kind of longevity in. But I have always cared about longevity and I have
tried to make career and life decisions that lend themselves toward
that goal.

I live in Texas because I think it keeps me grounded.
I did not want to get distracted by fame or believe in my own hype. The
worst thing for a writer is to become arrogant. When you think you know
everything, you can’t listen, and if you don’t listen you don’t learn,
and if you aren’t learning, you are starving the one thing a writer
needs most. I push myself to learn all the time. I read a lot and watch
the world around me so I can keep growing as a writer. Most songwriters
quit writing well in their 20s. Yet most novelists are the opposite -
they do their best work in their 50s and beyond. I think a lot of that
has to do with the lifestyle of these two groups.

I
take writing very seriously, and it has been a goal to be more than
just a 'hit' artist, but to be one that produces great writing and who
grows as a singer and writer. That’s why I have pushed myself so hard to
expand my boundaries. To write pop, country, rock. To explore dance, to
write poems and short stories and fiction. I won’t let my creative life
be stifled by genre or formula or any boundaries. Music and writing are
my playground and I want to explore every inch of it so I can express
my life authentically and honestly. So that when I look back on my life,
I won’t feel I shrunk, but expanded according to the courage I faced it
with. I don’t think this means I will always be successful at it. But I
will have the satisfaction of knowing I always tried my hardest.

A
fun side effect of this adventure has been that my core fans have not
only been with me every step of the way, faithfully going through live
recordings of unreleased songs and intimately educating themselves with
my entire body of 500 plus songs - but new fans have been folded into
the mix with each new project I do. I have fans that only knew me
through my 0304 album, who only discovered my first album
later. And I now have country fans that may have known my name before,
but are now getting to know me through my presence on country radio. I
am honored the country community has let me in and taken the time to let
me share my life with them. It’s been fun for me to talk about how I
was raised in Alaska and where I live now in Texas. But the best part
has been that country fans care about lyrics as much as I do! And
authenticity is still a currency that is valued with pride.